This time we chat with Lucas Woodland, frontman and lead singer/ songwriter of Welsh rock band Holding Absence in the lead up to their upcoming tour down under supporting the incredible You Me at Six for their final ever tour together as a band!
SR: Great to have you here man, I believe you guys are going to be touring over here in Australia with You Me At Six… you must be looking forward to the upcoming tour together which takes place early next year right?
Lucas : Yeah, very much so man! We love Australian culture, Australian people and we love Australian shows! Most importantly we are so happy to be coming back! It is going to be a very like ‘full circle’ feeling for us to be coming out and performing as the opening act for their last ever tour too!
SR: Yeah massive, have you toured with You Me At Six before?
Lucas: No, never ever toured with them before, I’m kind of friends with one or two of the members, but they are one of those kinds of bands who have kind of ‘eluded’ us throughout our career.
SR: How many times have you been over here to the land down under (Australia)?
Lucas: This will be our third time coming over, only ever in the last 3 years as well, so we have been very frequent since the pandemic hit the world over!
SR: What’s a favorite memory from one of your shows over here in Australia?
Lucas: We played at The Forum in Melbourne with Thornhill which was a really, really special show to us, yeah that really sticks out to me that one, I will always remember the first time we played Australia, it was a great show – it was in Brisbane. I think the venue was called the Tivoli. I remember I was like ‘Whoa! We’re on the other side of the planet and people know our band’. You know it sounds dumb but it’s kind of like baking a cake, if it doesn’t come out cooked you did it wrong, you know… We felt like we did everything we could to make sure our band was enjoyable internationally, but until you play a show you never really know, so it was quite a special moment for us I would say!
SR: Did you get to experience much sight-seeing over here in Australia?
Lucas: Yeah, I would say so, we went to a few Australian zoos, we seen all the crazy animals and all the kind of stereotypical stuff, but honestly, we stayed in Melbourne for 4 days before the last tour we did, so we flew and arrived quite early and it was really quite a special feeling. It felt like I lived in Melbourne for a half a week, just waking up and going for a walk or to the local food places, going for a coffee, or a sit down in a park , I do go and try and see the sights, but it is kind of hard sometimes when you are just kind of plonked in the city, you can never really get the pure strand of where you’re at, it will always be some kind of like you know, overwhelming city at the end of the day. But Australia is one of those places that has such a strong kind of culture that we have always felt very welcome there.
SR: You’ve released an album recently titled the Noble Art of Self Destruction how’s it being received by fans across the world?
Lucas: Very well man, yeah it’s been nice, I think when you’re in a band you hope every song you put out will change the world, or you know, it will be THE biggest thing you’ve ever done as a group, and other times you hope people just love the new songs, the Noble Art of Self Destruction was an album that helped us connect to our fanbase more, if that makes sense. There are some songs that felt (and are truly) deeply personal to the band, that and the way they have connected us to and from our fans has been amazing. I am proud of the album and it will be sad to kind of move on from it and onto the next one in a way.
SR: On that note, will we be seeing another album sooner rather than later from Holding Absence then?
Lucas: We’re definitely working on new music, but I think we are at a stage now where, well I joined this band nearly 9 years ago, and well it’s one of those things where we’ve kept our foot on the gas pedal for so long I think now it is almost important to take it off for a bit, make them (our fans) miss us a bit, for so long we’ve always been at like every event, every festival, we’re trying to breathe a little bit for people to enjoy what we do next even more, but on that note there is always more new music on the horizon when it comes to Holding Absence for sure.
SR: Have you finished doing music videos for songs featured on the Noble Art of Self-Destruction?
Lucas: Yep I would say so, there’s this track called Angel in the Marble I kind of wish we did a music video for, I have got to be honest, while still being transparent about the music industry, music videos aren’t really respected how I think they deserve to be a lot of the time, budget should be no issue these days but you just don’t get to make quite as many music videos as there should be, it’s in my opinion a big shame.
SR: What was your song writing inspiration on the Noble Art of Self-Destruction?
Lucas: I mean, lots of different places, but it was mainly inspired by I guess the albums before it which were very, very like emotional and very umm almost like too conceptual, you know I think this album was very much about me coming to grips with who I was on the other side of a lot of those emotions, it almost felt like a kind of therapy in some way, but a big thing that inspired that album was KITSUGE which is a Japanese artform of fixing broken plates with gold infused glue, so a plate becomes more valuable after becoming broken, that kind of metaphor pertaining to humanity hit me and I related it to humans and how we do evolve through the hardships of life, that was a big part of it, you know it’s like that was a big part of it.
SR: Is there anything you would like to say to your fans in Australia prior to the upcoming tour down under?
Lucas: No, just Thankyou to anyone who checked out our band, we’re grateful for all the love, and we’re very excited to be coming back early in the new year!
Don’t miss Holding Absence on their upcoming tour supporting You Me At Six for their final ever tour. Coming down under 2025.
YOU ME AT SIX and HOLDING ABSENCE
January 2025 Australian Tour Dates:
Friday 24th January BRISBANE, The Tivoli
Sunday 26th January SYDNEY, Enmore Theatre
Monday 27th January, MELBOURNE, The Forum
Wednesday 29th January, ADELAIDE, The Gov
Friday 31st January PERTH, Astor Theatre
Tickets: thephoenix.au/you-me-at-six/
